(1) Field of Invention
The present invention is related to the field of video teleconferencing, more specifically, the invention is a mobile remotely controlled video teleconferencing system.
(2) Related Art
Portable video teleconferencing systems, such as that described in Janda (U.S. Pat. No. USD208,634), have existed since the 1960s. The high costs of bandwidth and specialized equipment prevented widespread adoption for decades. The availability of inexpensive computers and broadband Internet access in the 1990s led to an explosion in the use of video teleconferencing. While video teleconferencing provides a more life-like user experience than phone teleconferencing, the inability of a user to move around in a remote location is still a serious limitation.
Mobile video teleconferencing robots allow a user to see, hear, and move around in a remote location. The ability to move around provides the user a much richer experience than conventional video teleconferencing because it is a closer approximation to actually being in the remote location. Despite this significant advantage, mobile video teleconferencing has not become a widely used technology. Rudimentary solutions such as placing a conventional video teleconferencing system on a manually movable cart do offer some improvement, but they necessitate a high degree of cooperation from the remote party that the user wishes to conference with. Niche market solutions such as Wang, et. al. (US Patent No. US20040117065A1) are inadequate for general use because they are costly, heavy, difficult to setup, difficult to transport, dangerous and not versatile.
More specifically, the device discussed in Wang allows doctors to remotely visit their patients in a hospital. However, the Wang device costs approximately $88,000 and is thus unsuitable for consumer or low-cost commercial use. (see http://edition.cnn.com/2005/TECH/05/18/Spark.robodoc/) The Wang device's extreme weight of approximately 200 pounds leads to many serious shortcomings. (see http://www.gizmag.com/go/3459/) Taking the device up and down stairs is difficult even with multiple people. Transporting the device by car is similarly impractical. The weight also leads to increased device cost due to the higher cost of shipping and requirement for additional raw materials. The weight also leads to a danger of collisions with people and animals which must be mitigated with costly sensors and electronics. A heavy device also necessitates a need for larger motors and larger batteries, which further add to the total device weight and cost.
The Wang device has several other design shortcomings that prevent it from being useful outside its intended niche. The height of its LCD and camera is not adjustable. This prevents the remote user from exercising a psychological advantage by being taller or shorter than the person he is communicating with. Additionally, this makes conversations with seated people awkward. The Wang device does not support stereo microphones. Consequently the remote user cannot determine the direction that sounds are coming from without a visual queue. This makes it difficult for the remote user to know who is talking when conversing with multiple people as might occur in a conference room.
The Wang device's low ground clearance and lack of gyroscopic video stabilization make it unsuitable for use on uneven ground. As far as is known, the Wang device does not have a docking station that allows the remote user to charge the device without local intervention. Thus a local user must be intervene periodically to keep the device operative. The Wang device also lacks a movable actuator which could be used for pressing elevator buttons. All of these limitations render the Wang device unsuitable for many applications.
Eric Paulos and John Canny's 1998 paper “PRoP: Personal Roving Presence” discuss a mobile video teleconferencing robot. Their ‘PRoP’ robot suffers from many of the same limitations as the Wang device robot. Among these deficiencies are the lack of stereo microphones, lack of gyroscopic image stabilization, lack of adjustable height, low ground clearance, and lack of remote charging capability.
Additionally, the PRoP robot suffers from some design deficiencies not found in the Wang device. Its LCD and camera are far from each other, which leads to eye-gaze preservation problems. Specifically, a local user looking straight into the eyes of the image displayed on PRoP's LCD will appear to the remote user to be looking away from him because of the distance between the LCD and the camera. While PRoP's camera can tilt to face the local user, its LCD does not which further compounds the eye-gaze preservation problem. Additionally, its LCD is very small which may make the local user feel like the remote user is far away even when PRoP is physically close to the local user.
The PRoP does not appear to be designed for easy hand carrying. Its base appears heavy and unwieldy. The stalk has no handle or suggested grip-point. Similarly, the stalk-base attachment point doesn't appear to be strong enough for the additional forces caused by hand-carrying. Additionally, the stalk gives no indication of being collapsable for easy shipment, relocation and storage of the device.
PRoP's height and base configuration results in an unstable design that leaves it susceptible to falling while traversing rough terrain, ramps, or in the event of a collision with a person or object. Furthermore, in the event the device does fall, no protective mechanisms are in place to protect PRoP's delicate electronics from damage. The lack of fall-over survivability limits the device's use in real-world applications.
An Internet appliance is a stand-alone special purpose consumer product which accesses the Internet and is easy to configure and use. Both PRoP and the Wang device both appear to require complicated installation and additional hardware to operate. Consequently, they are not Internet appliances, and are inappropriate for the consumer market.